


Infinite Jest, or The Curious Incident of the Pig Truck in the Night-Time

by hurry_sundown



Category: Slings & Arrows
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-17
Updated: 2013-06-17
Packaged: 2017-12-15 07:12:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/846769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hurry_sundown/pseuds/hurry_sundown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a telephone booth on the corner, a beacon in the night.  Oliver staggers to it, fumbles coins into the slot and starts dialing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Infinite Jest, or The Curious Incident of the Pig Truck in the Night-Time

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: "I saw the days of the year stretching ahead like a series of bright, white boxes, and separating one box from another was sleep, like a black shade. Only for me, the long perspective of shades that set off one box from the next day had suddenly snapped up, and I could see day after day after day glaring ahead of me like a white, broad, infinitely desolate avenue." -- Sylvia Plath, _The Bell Jar_
> 
> Beta by spuffyduds. First published September 11, 2007. Certain dialogue ~~stolen shamelessly~~ borrowed without permission from _Slings & Arrows_ Season 1, Episode 1, "Oliver's Dream," written and owned by someone(s) who is not me. Spoilers for that episode, _obviously_.

A is for alcohol.

B is for booze.

D is for drunk, which Oliver happens to be just now.

F is for --

Richard and fucking accessible productions.

Basil and fucking comfortable audiences.

Ellen and fucking _fucking_ whoever it is tonight.

Oliver laughs, because of course fucking Ellen is what got them where they are now.

He staggers.

Ellen wasn't the first time his ( _heart_ ) dick got him into trouble. There was that time in Edmonton, stoned out of his mind, and what was he not thinking when he stumbled into the alley behind that lovely boy with the long ... fingers.

Then there was Chicago, a good time had by all until he very nearly got arrested, but for the kindness of the patrolman with the extraordinarily stiff ... hair.

And that fucking island, not drunk or stoned unless you counted the mind-numbing boredom, he threw himself beneath the waves and _Oliver Saved from Drowning_ by a worn-looking local with rough hands and rougher ... voice.

About the only thing it hasn't done is got him abducted by aliens.

Oliver stops in the street. His feet are still but the rest of him is weaving.

Not my fault, he thinks. Not my fucking fault.

If he's going to lay blame, he knows where to put it.

There's a telephone booth on the corner, a beacon in the night. Oliver staggers to it, fumbles coins into the slot and starts dialing. Eventually --

"Did you know there are three Geoffrey Tennants in Shropshire? Apparently one of them is Jamaican. The other is eleven. And then there’s you."

_Do you remember me, Geoffrey? Do you remember the sound of my voice in your ear?_

"It’s Oliver, if you haven’t already guessed. A ghost from the past."

Geoffrey hangs up.

Oliver dials again.

_Let me say it, please. Let me say my peace - piece - my piece of peace. Please._

"I just wanted to tell you how proud I am of you. Chaining yourself to a condemned building. To defend the right of the insane to put on shows that no one will ever see."

Geoffrey hangs up again.

"Shit!"

Oliver dials again.

"Have mercy. I know you hate me. If you could see me now, you’d be happy. I’m pathetic. I am. Pathetic and miserable. I’m a failure. You’re a failure."

Not surprisingly, Geoffrey hangs up _again_.

"Shit, shit, shit!"

Oliver is running out of coins.

Somewhat surprisingly, Geoffrey returns to the phone.

Oliver pleads, "Why won’t anyone talk to me? Ellen can’t even look in my direction."

 _That_ gets Geoffrey's attention. _How fares she? How fares my lady Ophelia?_

"Ah, she hates me. She hates you. She hates herself. She’s getting old. She’s playing Gertrude. Oh, I’m sorry, I won’t mention that play. Don’t hang up. How are you? ... Look, I heard about your mother. She’s in a better place. God, you were so good. Incandescent. Why did you leave?"

Fuck. Ask a stupid question, why don't you? 

"It can’t be because of that thing with Ellen. We believed, remember, that greatness came with a price. That Hamlet that I brought out in you, it was ... it was definitive."

Yes, I. I made you what you -- no, what you _were_. Strike that, what you _are_. What we are. All of us.

"It was a crime that you only gave three performances. What a sin."

See how he represses, now. Why the fuck couldn't have you repressed a little then, Geoffrey, hmmn?

"Only a play? Mr. Chain-himself-to-a-warehouse. Everything I ever do will be compared to those three performances! You ruined my life."

And suddenly Geoffrey is not repressing, not at all, and just when he is about to impart to Oliver the answers to the universe, to unravel the mystery of why his dearest loves have deserted him, one and all -- Oliver hangs the fuck up.

Oh, Geoffrey.

His dear one, his all, his delight. The sum total of everything Oliver was, and could yet have been.

Geoffrey, who hung up on him ... three times? Four? No, that last one wasn't Geoffrey.

Oliver stumbles back into the street, teetering and tottering until he falls to the pavement with a thud, arms akimbo, strangely dignified.

The wind blows, ruffling his hair, and Oliver dreams.

There's Geoffrey in the bar, thanking Shakespeare, as if he weren't four hundred years' worth of dust, then into the alley, the three of them, Geoffrey flashing Hamlet's rapier and Oliver drunkenly candid.

"I’m getting too old for all these theatrical antics."

Geoffrey is on, still, over the top, and all Oliver can offer is his heartfelt, "Bravo, Geoff. Bravo."

But Geoffrey is babbling to Ellen, darling Ellen, his first creation, and Oliver'd got it backward, hadn't he, creating a woman for practice and then a man -- unlike You-Know-Who.

Perfect, perfect, that was the player and the play, and Geoffrey knows they can't and they must do it the very same way, again. And again. And again.

Oliver is with him there. "Aye, there’s the rub. Because anything else-"

Even a well-lit hell is still a hell. 

Then there starts the lovey-dovery. Oliver is expecting this. In his somewhat younger days he'd have had someone bent over a table by now, or be over one himself. Adrenaline did that to you, and yes, yes, we all love each other, isn't it wonderful? So why aren't we --

What the _fuck_ did Geoffrey just say?

Oliver means to say No, no, no, a thousand times no, but what comes out of his mouth is "Please, such a flagrant display of unbridled heterosexuality."

Then they're turning to go. Leaving. Leaving? They can't really mean --

"Where are you going? Party’s just starting!"

Geoffrey cracks wise while Oliver just cracks.

"Don’t go!"

( _BEEP!_ )

They're still going.

( _BEEEP!_ )

"Don’t leave me alone, you bastards. Not tonight! _Geoffrey!_ Don’t leave me here! I can’t go back to the party. I don’t like anyone. Asshole. Fuck."

( _BEEEEP!_ )

Oliver dreams.

 _Exeunt omnes_.


End file.
